Blue Hawaii
by Mrs Dizzy
Summary: Patrick Jane does not do 'conventional'. A fluffy little piece that hopefully makes you smile. Summary probably better/worse than the actual piece.


**Author's Note**: _As this is my very first published piece of fanfiction, I ask you to be gentle with me. All mistakes below are mine but 'The Mentalist' is not. See you in the reviews. Hopefully._

**Blue Hawaii**

If there was one thing to look forward to, he mused, it was trying to get a rise out of his current boss, CBI Senior Agent Teresa Lisbon.

At this very moment, former 'psychic' now CBI consultant extraordinaire just plain Mister Patrick Jane was sitting on the battered brown leather couch in his corner of the bullpen solving Sudoku puzzles. But as always, what he was really doing was tuning in to the people around him.

Agent Kimball Cho was being his usual stoic self, talking to someone on the phone. Agent Grace Van Pelt was busy looking up information on her computer, while Agent Wayne Rigsby was doing paperwork. That Rigsby could get anything done was doubtful as he was spending more time staring at Van Pelt, who for some reason was completely oblivious to it. A blind man with a blind fold on could see that Rigsby was giving Van Pelt moon-eyes. Jane smiled to himself, taking comfort in the everyday goings of the CBI office. Life had its good sides.

And it was about to get a little bit better. All he had to do was wait for a certain petite dark-haired green-eyed boss lady to walk down the hall.

The team knew that she wasn't going to be in until later today. She was attending something that they referred to in a mile long acronym. Law enforcement people sure loved their acronyms. The longer the acronym, the more important the thing seemed to be.

Patrick Jane had to admit that since starting his consulting work with the CBI, he had acquired the habit of taking his morning tea with a bit of Lisbon teasing. It was the only reason why he tried to get in, if not on time, early enough for a morning cup with the boss. However, today he'd been glad that Lisbon hadn't been there in the morning. It had given him plenty of time to get some things done.

Imagining the various reactions she was going to have almost made him giggle. Any second now, he thought.

It was imperceptible to any casual observer but Jane found his body tense in anticipation at the sound of very insistent footsteps. "Oh goody, she's come out to play," he thought, trying to keep his face as neutral as possible.

The footsteps stopped right in front of him. He looked up, gave the owner of the footsteps his most endearing I-couldn't break-a-cracked-egg look, wondering what was going to happen next. Okay, this wasn't exactly how he imagined it would be.

"There's a kiddie pool in my office," Senior Agent Teresa Lisbon announced.

"Cool," he flippantly replied, biting back the laughter that was trying to escape. Shame he missed her reaction when she first saw that little tableau in her office. He had really thought that she was going to say hello to the team first. Oh well, he couldn't control _everything_.

Patrick Jane had done some really despicable things in his former career and karma had decided to pay him back in the worst way possible. Yet somehow, despite all the guilt and remorse and anger that kept him from being truly okay with the world, he had moments of lightness. And even though he didn't think he deserved them, he was grateful and maybe just a bit too selfish to not enjoy them.

And if there was one thing to look forward to, it was trying to get a rise out of the woman standing right in front of him. There was a distinctly bemused expression on her face.

The team had a similarly bemused expression. Well, with Cho you couldn't really tell, but Van Pelt and Risgby did look bemused. And interested.

"A kiddie pool, boss?" Van Pelt asked, looking at Jane.

"Yes. And a deck chair, a pile of sand... and Elvis," Lisbon answered, not taking her eyes off the consultant. She might be the tough boss lady around here, but Lisbon wasn't fooling Jane. Not with that twinkle in her clear green eyes.

"Elvis," Cho said with no discernible inflection. Jane decided that it was a question.

"Is there water in the kiddie pool?" Rigsby asked. Lisbon turned to give him a look. "Sorry," he muttered.

She turned back to Jane, "Actually, there is." Jane couldn't help himself this time, he laughed. "What's the point of a kiddie pool if there isn't any water in it?" he asked. Lisbon shook her head, looking exasperated, but he could see that she was trying to suppress a smile.

He smiled at her, "There's also a margarita…without the alcohol of course as you're still on duty, so it's really just a lemon juice in a fancy glass. And I bet it's warm now."

Lisbon gave him a long hard stare. He gave her his most contrite and sincere puppy-dog look. Lisbon sighed, "Okay, I accept your apology."

"Really?" he asked her, his tone solemn. He could have just told Lisbon that he was sorry for ruining her day off at the beach, but Patrick Jane did not do conventional. Besides, the circumstances for why she had to come in to work that day had been special.

The truth was that she had saved him from himself. Eventually though, when he _would_ find the real Red John, he knew he'd break her heart completely. There would be no apology to make her forgive him, however unconventional it may be.

But for now he tried to hold on to the slightest bit of affection Lisbon had for him. He never thought that he'd value someone's grudging respect for him so much.

"You could have just talked to me," she said. There was that look in her eyes again, the same one she'd given him after Minelli had given them both hell for his foolish actions. He had tried to tell her then and there, but somehow the words hadn't come. His disappointment at the false lead and his anger at himself for his own stupidity had left him too troubled to form any coherent apology. Then there was also the guilt. It was after she muttered "I should have gone to Hawaii" that Jane knew that the damages were still not irreparable and a plan had materialised in his very imaginative mind.

„Wouldn't have been as much fun," he replied, regretting how that sounded. He didn't want Lisbon to think that he wasn't serious about his apology. But he hadn't counted on an audience of more than one. As much as he liked the people he worked with and trusted them with his life, he still wasn't comfortable enough to show them his heart, or what was left of it anyway. However, it was important to him that Lisbon understood how much he valued her. She deserved more than he could give.

Lisbon gave him one of those looks, the one that saw more than he was willing to show. She was more observant than he gave her credit for sometimes. He understood that years of bureaucracy had left Lisbon at a disadvantage. Having to factor in the politics of a situation didn't allow her to see things as black and white as he often did. But she was good at her job, maybe because she saw things in shades of grey. Sure it made her miss some of the things that were glaringly obvious to Jane, but it also had saved him from making worse mistakes than the ones he'd already done. Not that there was probably anything worse than getting his family brutally murdered by a serial killer because he was just too arrogant for his own good.

Lisbon's beautiful green eyes were still boring into, it seemed like to him, the depths of his soul and he somehow felt like he was coming up short. Then something shifted inside of her, he could sense it, and she gave him the tiniest of nods.

Jane hadn't expected the relief that flooded his very being at that. They were okay, for now at least.

"I'm going for lunch now," Lisbon announced. Jane smiled, "Want some company?" She shook her head, "What I want is for you to make sure that the little beach scene in my office is gone when I'm back."

"Elvis too?" he teasingly asked. "Yup, Elvis too," she replied in her best boss voice, but he heard the laughter that was trying to escape.

"Yes ma'am," he drawled in his best King imitation.

This time, Teresa Lisbon laughed. It was a sound filled with so much joy and mischief that Jane wished he could bottle and save it for a rainy day.

She looked at her team, "Don't let him wheedle you into helping him with the clean-up." The three agents nodded, but he knew that he could get them to help him.

"I'll see you later," Lisbon said, giving them a parting smile. She gave him a last stern look, at which he couldn't resist asking, "Are you sure about Elvis?"

Lisbon laughed again, gave the team a wave and left. Jane knew that he was sitting there with an idiotic grin on his face.

If there was something to look forward to, he admitted, it was getting a laugh out of Teresa Lisbon.

Rigby cleared his throat, "So... how did you get the water into the kiddie pool?"


End file.
